What would you like to see in Lightroom 4

[Hamish Gill]

It can't be far off now surly?

I'd like to see:

Better tethering with live view and camera controls!

If possible I'd like to see it run in a way that wasn't so heavy on ram usage (I don't know much about this sort of thing so I don't know how realistic that is)

More options for local adjustments, maybe a couple that the user could allocate to certain controls

More options within gradients - I often find my self wishing I could curve the line of the grad being applied

I'd also like a slider to control the belief in my self as a photographer ... But that might be to much to ask!

Any thoughts anyone?

 

[Pete Askew]

Decent borders not associated with export / output. Maybe also some sort of layer control.

 

[Hamish Gill]

Huh ... "Boarder control"

Anyway...

Don't you think layers are counterproductive to the simplicity of it all ...
What could be gained with layers that wouldn't be too much of a step toward PS

 

[Tim Pindar]

I'd like to see full integration with Photoshop Elements, as well as Photoshop. However that could be a strategic step they don't want to take.

 

[Pete Askew]

Maybe, but I often go into PS from LR so I can run a certain effect and then adjust the intensity using layer opacity. For example, using a monochrome layer over colour to give a highly controlled Bleach Bypass.

 

[Paul Lange]

I 2nd borders. Also unless its just me not working it out yet, it would be nice to have user defined presets that are stackable with others, just like some of the stock ones such as the sharpening and grain presets. A free transform and warp tool would be nice to correct parallax error on shots of buildings etc.

 

[Pete Askew]

Actually, a better transform would be good. I don't find the current perspective correction very useful.

Do you mean other than right clicking in the presets area and creating folders for certain types?

 

[Paul Lange]

I'm not sure I follow Pete. Some of the presets supplied with LR sharpen the image or add contrast etc etc. I noticed that for example you could use one o fthe B&W presets and then apply the one of the sharpening presets over the top so to speak.

 

[Pete Askew]

Sorry Paul. I misunderstood you - I understand now. I was thinking stackable as in filed together.

 

[Paul Lange]

I looked into the stackable presets issue a bit more and discovered something interesting. Presets can be stackable if you creating them in the correct way. When you save a preset a dialog asks you what settings would you like saved on the preset. If you uncheck the boxes for the settings that have not been changed the image will retain its previous settings for these when you apply the preset.

Sometimes this is not ideal as you may not remember what you have and have not changed and once the dialog is up you cant scroll down the various settings to see. In this case save the preset with everything checked and then right click on the preset from within LR. You then select Show in Explorer (or in Containing Folder for Mac) This will take you to the folder where the presets live. Open the preset in Word Pad (or Text Edit for Mac) and you will see that the preset is just a text list of settings with a value assigned to them. If you delete all the settings that have been assigned a zero value and save the file the preset will not change these settings when you select it.

You cannot modify the stock presets that were supplied with LR but you can stack these by applying the preset and then selecting Edit Image in Photoshop (you want to edit the image with LR preset applied) . You then save the image in PS and close it and go back to LR. The saved image will retain the presets visual changes but all the settings return to default. You then select the next stock preset that you want to apply over the top.

I've typed this quite quickly so I hope it makes sense.

 

[Hamish Gill]

So is this for when eg you have a vignette that you like you make it into a preset. Then you might have a combination of split tones and adjustments to HSL as a separate preset etc etc

This has taken me a little time to get my head round for some reason ... I don't think I use presets in the same way you do/would like to do ...

I can see why this would be useful though i think ...

 

[Richard Sloman]

I'd like to see some kind of local contrast adaptation, and a brush that allows you to apply the same kind of control as you get from the main sliders.

And a simplified form of Photoshops layers. I've noticed a few other programmes implementing this, so fingers crossed...

 

[Hamish Gill]

where specifically do you feel the local adjustment brush falls short? range of controls?
I find it pretty good for most things ... although it did annoy me for ages when i hadnt realised i had ticked auto mask!

 

[Richard Sloman]

Yeah, I think it would be useful for example to allow the brush to increase the amount of blacks or recovery as per the global sliders, but in a more localised way.

Oh, and I'd like to be able to more easily control the black point without having to faff about with split toning.

 

[Richard Sloman]

Basically I'd like an easier to use Photoshop for photographers with Lightroom's cataloging ;-)

 

[Hamish Gill]

not much then

I know what your getting at ...
One thing i like about lightroom is this sort of slow trickle of new features we get every year ...
Gives you time to learn more things and find more limitations
I guess they will always keep some gap between it and photoshop mind

 

[Richard Sloman]

Don't get me wrong, I absolutely love Lightroom and I think Adobe have got it pretty much spot on for 99% of basic photo editing that people need to do.

It's just never enough, it's like you know there's a large carrot on a stick around somewhere, you just can't find it...

 

[Allan Batchelor]

I haven't used LT before only Aperture for my Mac or PS